When Ideas Become Orders

In the improvisation of life, sometimes it takes going back and reviewing a scene in my head to see why I reacted as I did.

Recently, I took the time to step back and ponder a gut reaction I had to one of life's scenes.

The behavior that inspired such a strong (angry) reaction from me was an idea thrown out to a group.

Ideas! I love ideas! I love to brainstorm with people, I love to get the energy flowing I love to turn the best ideas into action plans and implement them.

So . . . being angry due to an idea, that was out-of-character, right?

Wrong.

The person who shared the idea is someone in the group who honestly never does any of the heavy lifting. This person shows up to meetings, throws out a bunch of "ideas" and then disappears until the next month's meeting. I got angry because I felt bossed around. I realized that it wasn't an idea thing at all, but, it was a STATUS thing!  This person was pulling high status on the rest of the group! (Click HERE to read my post on status.)

The idea was really an ORDER.

It was a directive to others in the group to put time and effort into implementing a plan devised by this person.

This self-avowed "idea person" was really a dictator.

No one likes a dictator. Dictators inspire loathing.

Leaders inspire. Leaders do their part in implementing an idea.

This scene in the improv of life gave me the gift of insight.

I love ideas and I don't want to be a dictator, so, I've decided that unless I'm willing to put in the sweat/time/effort to seeing an idea of mine to fruition, I'll do my best to KEEP IT TO MYSELF!